Taking Sides: the TLS v. the LRB

Pankaj Mishra's piece is doing the rounds but it's also been taken apart in this thread. Linking to stuff on Primo Levi here.

I can't believe someone can be let print such nonsense in what's supposed to be a respected magazine. Levi of course never said that the Commentary thing "estinguished his will to live" in any serious way, I know all the interviews he did during the 80s. The Commentary article…

— Annibale (@Annibal97783312) March 3, 2024

Terry Eagleton: "The only good reason for being a socialist, apart from annoying people you don't like, is that you don't like to work".

It strikes me this would be more accurate if you replaced "being a socialist" with "posting to ILX".

it me

eagleton always better when you replace key parts of his sentences IME

i was going to post a note abt his recent hegel-related review in the LRB, which is full of sly nonsense lol, but i've been busy with work (which i don't like)

Trying to go one better: play with being a tankie, which angers absolutely everybody around you, and causes more work than its worth.

haven't read a copy so i might be wrong, but something about the fence gives me a bad vibe

the vibe is maybe oxbridge student mag for the hip london lit crowd

Essays really short at times. Gornick on the Village Voice - - besides the anecdote at the beginning - - felt really slim, full of things unsaid, maybe?

feeling very seen in this essay on dark matter:
“WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles), which might weigh anything between ten thousand and a million times more than an electron“

wait till you hear about p-branes
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brane